Wednesday, July 15, 2009

Hohaiyan Rock Festival at Fulong Beach

Wow. This past weekend was hot, sandy and fantastic. I found out the 10th annual Hohaiyan Rock Festival was taking place directly on Fulong Beach, which is on the Northeast Coast of Taiwan. As soon as I heard the unbeatable combination of music and ocean views, I was in.


We (over) packed Friday night and left at 7 a.m. Friday morning, which should establish my level of eagerness to get there. Actually, the main reason we left so early was to beat the insane crowds of people that would be jamming in every nook and inch of floor space on the 1 and 1/2 hour train ride there. A friend who was going to moped there later asked if we would meet up with two girls new to Taiwan who would also be taking the train. We set off with our two awesome new friends bright and early, practically all glowing in our pale skin, blissfully unaware of the degree of sunburn that was in store for us later...


The Longmen Campsite has beautiful grounds just ten minutes from the beach and is only 800NT a night for a four-person tent, so we thought that would be the perfect accomodation for the night. I tried to call earlier in the week and make reservations, shakily asking in Chinese if they spoke English, but to no avail. We decided we would just chance it and check it out when we got there. Well the fact that we ended up camping on the beach under the stars should tell you how that went.


It was literally one of those perfect, straight-from-a-movie days. Deep blue skies, fluffly clouds rolling over the mountains, and waves strong enough to knock you over standing up at knee-level. We set up far enough down the length of the beach to be away from the crowds, yet close enough to hear the music playing in the background as they were setting up the stage. In the afternoon we wandered down the beach to where there were endless rows of red and white striped tents selling drinks, ice cream, snacks, beach apparel, sunglasses, etc.


We loaded up with treats and spent the rest of the morning/afternoon jumping in the waves and hanging on the beach. After we finally noticed that, despite our repeated slathering of sunscreen, we were getting fried, we went over by the pay part of the beach to where the Taiwanese were (wisely) all taking refuge from the sun under giant umbrellas, over-sized floppy hats, and tented shelters. It was too late to rent one of our own, but we made some friends and shared their shade.


Night finally rolled around, and we had some great Taiwanese food- delicious pork and vegetable dumplings covered in soy and a sandwich loaded with grilled veggies and meats, covered in different spices. A few cold Taiwan beers and our group of about 10 was all set for the music festival. We arrived at the concert area, and noticed that virtually everyone had dug deep trenches in the sand, kind of like the beach version of concert bleachers. We started digging and soon had our own comfy sand seats- we lined them with our towels and settled back to enjoy the tunes. The music from mostly local bands ranged from rock to beach reggae- Some of it was great, some was terrible, (most of it we couldn't understand) but we had a blast anyway. Randomly a band would throw in English in a song and then we would all try and sing along to the few words we recognized :)



We finally all got kicked off the concert area of the beach when the show ended, which left us all wondering what to do. We were unsure if we were going to be allowed to stay on the beach, but finally succeeded in convincing the officials we would be staying far, far down on the beach (therefore we wouldn't be a liability, as last year someone drowned). We made a bonfire and had a great time hanging on the beach until we finally succumbed to our exhausted state from the day in the sun and decided to skip the midnight swimming and try and get some sleep. Some of our friends had the foresight to bring tents, but Bacon and I just had a blanket and pillow each. It was definitely a cool experience camping out right under the stars and waking up to the sunrise, though our sunburns and sand whipping in our faces all night made it hard to get a good sleep.


We were planning on staying the whole next day, but we knew it would be not be a good idea as we were literally burned out :) We trudged back to the train station, sticking out even more than usual. All said and done, an awesome weekend that will stick out as one of the highlights of the summer thus far.


1 comments:

Anonymous said...

Wow, Alisha. I don't think your whiteness was made for the Taiwanese sun. You are burned to a crisp!! haha

Austin

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